GREENMEYER, ERNEST H., for the past twenty five years the popular and efficient city engineer of Beardstown, Cass County, Ill., is a native of this city, where his birth took place January 11, 1861. He is a son of John Frederick and Dorothy (Friecke) Greenmeyer, who were born in Hanover, Germany, where they grew up and were married, then emigrated to the United States, crossing the ocean to New Orleans by sailing vessel, and up the rivers by boat to Beardstown, where they located on a farm at the edge of the town. John Frederick Greenmeyer spent the remainder of his life there engaged in farming and died in 1882 at the age of sixty years, his widow passing away in 1894, when seventy-four years old. They had the following children: Anna (Mrs. John W. Hobrock), who died in 1885; Mary (Mrs. Dr. J. A. Folonie), deceased in 1897; and Ernest H.

In boyhood Ernest H. Greenmeyer attended the German Lutheran and public schools of Beardstown, and at the age of thirteen years began to work on a farm by the month, continuing this until he was twenty one years old. At this period he started in the employ of the C. B. & Q. Railroad in the shops in Beardstown, where he remained tow years. He then became an engineer, but the railroad strike in February, 1888, caused him to give this up, and he fired and ran extra on the Big Four Railroad from Mattoon, Ill., for two and one half years. Later he was employed two and one half years at Lafayette, Ind., and returning to Beardstown became city engineer, which position he has held since.

On May 1, 1884, Mr. Greenmeyer was united in marriage with Dina Koblenz, the ceremony being performed at Beardstown, where Mrs. Greenmeyer was born. She is a daughter of Charles and Marguerite (Depe) Koblenz, natives of Prussia, Germany. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Greenmeyer are as follows: Theresa, wife of A. J. Nolden, engineer of the Beardstown Milling Company; C. O., of Chicago, Ill., with the Continental and Commercial National Bank; and Dorothy D., wife of Fred Valentiner, of Beardstown, engineer on the C. B. & Q. R.R. Mr. Greenmeyer is a member of the German Lutheran church. He has been identified with the B. of L.F. & E. of Beardstown since 1886. He and his family are respected and esteemed wherever their acquaintance extends.